Thank you again and again for your wonderful comments.

Here is a new chapter. M rating for a couple of sentences regarding New Caprica's detention (better safe than sorry).

I have my oldest daughter home for a week, so I will not be writing much and instead spending quality time with her. Do not expect anything new until next weekend at least.

Enjoy this chapter!

Chapter 31

The old woman sat quietly with the team around the fire, smiling and for a few minutes nobody dared to say anything. Then Takashi cleared his throat.

"I am Takashi Inoue. I am the leader of our scientific team." In turn, members of the team proceeded to introduce themselves. When Helena spoke, the woman looked at her with interest.

"You know our language. How?"

"Not very well, I'm afraid. I have difficulties with the pronunciation." Helena answered, eluding the question.

"What is your name?" Takashi asked.

"I am Elosha of Caprica," she said, "I believe you have met my daughter, Sharon."

Sharon was quietly smiling. "Sharon will replace me, one day as village chief."

Elosha's attention turned back to Helena.

"You did not answer my question."

Helena waited a couple of seconds, making eye contact with Takashi, who nodded.

"We found Laura Roslin's grave on top of the Lady's Ridge Mountain. Next to her grave, there was a sealed crate, with books. I am a linguist, specialized in ancient languages. It has been over a year now. I have worked with the books and I have been able to learn the language it was written in. I made the educated guess that it was similar to your language or probably at the root of it. I am here to learn more about your people."

The old woman closed her eyes for a moment, overwhelmed by emotion.

"You found Laura Roslin? The Dying Leader, who led her people to Earth?" She whispered in awe. "How do you know it is indeed her?" Her piercing blue eyes looked right into Helena's green eyes, inquisitive.

Helena replied softly: "Laura wrote notes about her life and her journey in a diary. It was found among other books in the crate."

"Do you have these books here?"

"No. They are very old and very fragile. They have to be kept in special conditions, or they will turn into dust. We have scanned the pages with various scientific equipments that allow us to see the pages without touching the books. We have a lot of questions for you."

"Yes, I am sure you do. I have a lot of questions as well. The story of Laura Roslin has been passed from generation to generation, along with the story of our people."

Helena got up and went to her bag, grabbing her binder.

"Elosha, I would like to hear more about her story and what you know. When we discovered the books, we also found a picture. It was in very bad condition, and our chemists had to analyze the pigments and they digitalized the picture so that we can view it." Helena opened her binder and pulled the digital print of the picture that had been enhanced. She handed it to the older woman, who took it in trembling fingers and starred at it. Immediately her right hand reached for the bracelet on her left arm, which she touched lightly.

"Yes, this is Laura Roslin."

"May I ask a question?" Helena softly said. "The bracelet you are wearing? Where does it come from?"

Elosha smiled. "This bracelet is given to the village chief, who is the Quorum leader. Every year, a different chief assumes the responsibility for the Quorum meetings. It has been passed from woman to woman."

"Since Laura?"

"Since Laura, yes, she was the leader of our people."

"Who is the man in the picture?" Helena asked.

"He is Laura Roslin's husband, William Adama. Our legend says that she arrived on Earth with him, and others. But the dying leader was never meant to survive the journey. She was ill, you see, with a wasting disease, as the scriptures say. The Lords of Kobol granted her a respite, so that she would die in peace surrounded by love." The old woman looked at Helena, who had tears in her eyes.

"Yes, she did. She was surrounded by love."

"And now," Elosha said softly, as she took Helena's hands in hers, "now, she has found you. You are carrying her message."

"Organizing Baltar's trial seemed a lot more easy said than done. Once we released the information that Baltar was on board the Galactica, we had to double his security as many tried to sneak in his cell to assassinate him. It turns out many people wanted revenge for what happened on New Caprica, for those they loved who got lost, killed, raped or tortured in the prisons. On my end, I was facing huge difficulties with the organization. There were safety issues first of all, and then there simply weren't many lawyers on the fleet. We had a composite of twelve colonies on board of the fleet; each colony had their own law system, different civil and criminal codes, which were not even available for consultation. We did not have a law library. I needed some help. Zarek was furious with me for allowing the trial to happen. He would definitely have eliminated Baltar. He said to me that I was risking the stability of the fleet, which was still shaky after the liberation of New Caprica, to give this man a trial. He was anticipating uproar, terrorism, anger and even the possibility that some would seek revenge against me as well. He had a much better feeling of what the population was thinking, unlike me, isolated on Colonial One. Yet, I stood firm on my decision. It had been tough to take; I would not turn back on it. When he left, Tory and I knew that he was right. And we were determined to take all measure to prevent a breakdown of our government."

"I went back on Galactica to oversee the interview of Caprica Six. Sharon, being a cylon, was asked to chat with her to see if she would confide in one of her kind. But she did not and Sharon was unsuccessful in extracting information from her. While Colonel Tigh was trying to convince me to use more violent methods during one of our meetings, I refused. I was adamant we would not use such methods ever again. We would not become worse than our enemies. When Tigh insisted, I raised my voice. 'No! We are not doing this!' Bill turned to look at me, probably wondering where this bout of anger was coming from. Bill quickly dismissed Tigh and turned to me.

'What was that about?'

I remained sitting on his sofa with my head in my hands, whispering:

'I don't want Caprica Six hurt in any way. We have done enough of this.'

He looked at me surprised.

'She is a cylon.'

'She is a cylon, who saved me, twice during my detentions on New Caprica.'

He sat next to me, cradling a glass of alcohol.

'You want to talk about it? How did she save you?'

'Bill, I already told you what happened.'

I sighed and remained silent for a couple of minutes, deliberating how much more I should tell him. I did not want to go back on this. I just wanted closure. I had tiptoed around the deeply disturbing memories of my detention. Him, the only person, I could share this with and certainly one I did not want to share any of those details with. He was the only person I trusted enough to respect me. And yet, I am not sure why he needed to know so much how much I suffered. We were at equal levels, he and I. There was nobody else who could understand better what it meant to rule, the sacrifices we made each day, and the terrible weight of power. I reached for his glass, which he surrendered without protest, and drank a long sip before I returned it to his hands.

Looking in front of me, I spoke with a low voice.

'It was a rape, Bill, alright? What more do you want to know? Do I have to relive this humiliation, because you want to have details? How do you think I feel? Caprica Six stopped it a second before… he entered me,' my voice broke and we looked at each other.

Bill sighed deeply, looking down, and took a sip of his glass.

'Days later, Cavil beat me up with a belt and a second time around. Both times Caprica Six stopped them. The second time, apparently, I got very sick with an infection and she provided me with medication and care. She saved my life, Bill. There is nothing else to know.'

He took my hand while I struggled with my emotions. I relaxed against the sofa, let my head fall back on the sofa's edge and closed my eyes. His comforting presence was grounding. There was not need for us to speak, as we let our emotions freely flow. I felt him relax back too. Then he said: 'How are you healing?'

'It's much better than the day I showed you. There will be permanent scars, yeah.'

He nodded. Then he got up, walked over the phone and picked it up. I heard him say.

'The number Six cylon will not be interrogated without my presence or the President's. She must remain safe at all times. Order of the President.'

He walked back to me.

'Thank you' I said, looking at him. I knew I had to return on Colonial One soon, still I indulged in a quiet rest with him, as he took at book from his shelf and started to read aloud. It was simple. It was comforting."

"I spent the next days working on Baltar's trial and government matters. We had our scheduled Quorum meeting, where we discussed the trial and the colonies representatives were worried as well. I assured them we would take all necessary precautions to avoid unrest. I started to sleep a little better and still I felt tired. Meeting to meeting. News conference after news conference, the press had a field day with the trial preparations. I really did not leave Colonial One. I had heard of the unrest with the civilians aboard Galactica and the case of the civilian doctor who killed Sagittarons, because of their ethnicity and their religious beliefs. I heard of diseases spreading among the civilian population. This was a situation that could very well become explosive at any time and Baltar's trial could also be the detonator of this. I had no time to think back of the past."

"The only highlight of an otherwise boring day was that Tory found a old book of mine among the belongings she brought back from New Caprica: a mystery book that one of the colonist had given to me in exchange for helping their children at the school. It made me think of Bill and the book he gave me a long time ago. We had not seen each other in the past weeks. We both had been busy. I decided to take this opportunity to go to the Galactica, finding the good excuse that I needed to exercise. I was hoping that it would help the fatigue, which just would not go away despite my attempts at resting. So I found some loose clothing suitable for a gym, packed up everything in a bag and took a shuttle over to Galactica. I met with Bill for an agenda in the conference room. We had not met since the interrogation of Caprica Six, but we had long talks over the phone. I started to sleep better again, now that I started to remember the forgotten gaps of my detention ordeal. My anxiety subsided and I was very busy, simply doing my job. Bill and I did not mention my detention again. Our affection was deep. We did not however resume our relationship as it was on New Caprica. It was over, sunk at the bottom of a lake with my dreams; we both knew that we needed to focus on our respective positions in the fleet, he the Admiral, I the president. A relationship between us was quite unrealistic and would compromise our positions. Our friendship and the tenderness we shared were still there, though. We were both in work mode and the setting, quite public in the conference room, was not the place for a personal conversation. Still, I needed some advice with the trial and I had recalled that Adama's father, Joseph Adama, had been quite a famous lawyer back on Caprica. I suggested giving a job to his son, Lee, who seemed perfect for this. After all, he was Captain Apollo, loyal, honest and on our side. I could use someone like him to go through the meanders of Colonial Law and screen potential lawyers. There was so much work to do in the government, that I could not do it all by myself, and Tory really lacked the qualities I needed for this task. Bill said he would consider it and that he did not get along very well with his father, Joseph Adama. He was just not sure Lee would accept. According to Bill, I was suffering from OBE, overcome by events, as they call it when one start going stir crazy not leaving their ships. I had not gone out in a while and I was missing Bill. I was missing my friend. I went to the gym to vent some of my frustration; and Bill was so right to say that it smelled like the inside of a shoe. Some people turned around, surprised to see me there. My hair pulled up, I ran on the thread mill for a good half an hour, welcoming the exercise and the relief from stress it provided; I don't think I would have been able to last longer in the hot sweaty and tight room, which served as a gym, without getting claustrophobic. It was bad enough I was locked all day in the rather small space of Colonial One. I used to run back on Caprica, but mostly I used to swim. I would have given anything for a pool. There used to be one on Cloud Nine. But the ship exploded in a tragic act of terrorism right after Baltar was elected. I never had a chance to visit it. The pool made me think of my lake and the hours spent swimming there during the summer. One thought led to another as I was running, and soon I had to resist and prevent my thoughts from going into more intimate moments. Heads turned around when I headed, drenched in sweat, to the gym showers and ran the water cold to help me snap out of my yearning. Tory had secured some privacy for me in the otherwise crowded unisex showers, which made her quite unpopular at the moment. After my shower and dressed back as the president, Tory and I grabbed something to eat in the officers' mess and I made my way back to the conference room to finish some reports. I heard about the accident involving the chief and his wife. This was a huge concern of mine. Ships had been in space for a long time now without repairs. We fought tough battles on them and got hit a lot. Accidents of such nature were bound to happen more and more often, jeopardizing our survival. We needed some down time for the ships to be checked thoroughly and needed repairs made. It was critical that we reach Earth soon enough. I really do not know how many more battles this old fleet could take."

"At the end of the day, Bill found me in the conference room working on my papers. I was happy he came back to see me. After he informed me that the chief and his wife were good, I decided to give him the book Tory found. 'Blood Runs at Midnight' sounds like a pretty bad novel, but I told him that he probably would like it. It is indeed a pretty good mystery. I remembered fondly how he gave me a book way back only a few days after we met. 'And it's not a loan. It's a gift' I was happy I could repay him somehow for his book, now left on New Caprica among my belongings in a trunk inside a tent. I was packing my gym bag and putting files away, when I heard him say:

'Do you ever think about the times much on New Caprica?' We both knew what he meant.

'I try to think about the good times, yes, I do.' I looked at him tenderly when he tried clumsily to elaborate further. We had been carefree, happy and for precious moments had let go of our responsibilities, to live and be human.

'One in particular stands out, in my mind. You were wearing a really bright red dress, said you wanted to build a cabin.' I smiled, recollecting with fondness those wonderful moments and looking at the man, who was trying so hard to tell me something. Just like me, he clearly had been thinking about those moments.

'It was Baltar's groundbreaking ceremony.' We looked at each other in the eyes, hidden feelings shared in an instant. 'I got a little silly that night.' This is as close as I would get from blushing. And I don't blush. He nodded. What happened on New Caprica, stayed on New Caprica.

'Do you ever wondered what would have happened if the cylons hadn't come back?' I suddenly remembered the terrible weather patterns, the storms, the snow and the freezing cold.

'Well, I think given Baltar and the terrain, we couldn't have made a go of it.'

I added 'What about you, do you think you would have stayed on Galactica or would you have settled?' And there it was… in the open, the question I had wanted to ask for a long time. Would he have retired and come live with me in my cabin? He told me by the lake, when we kissed, that he could not settle right now. But eventually, as life went along, would he have settled? He was getting old. I certainly was not young anymore, and we needed that peace and love, and retire quietly. He evaded the question.

'It's pretty hypothetical, isn't it?'

'It is, until it isn't' I really meant that. I really meant that he would have had to make that decision eventually. It came out quite funny and I could not stop myself from laughing.

'Did I just say that?' I said.

'It was worth just seeing you laugh like that' And, I realized I could not remember the last time I had laughed that freely… Yes, I could. The last time I had laughed like that was the day I was wearing a really bright red dress and we had smoked under the stars. We were thinking the same thing, when he added: 'We've been at war for so long sometimes we forget what we are fighting for, to raise our kids in peace. Enjoy one another's company. Live life as people again.'

We had lived and loved as people again.

'Like that night on New Caprica', I replied, 'that's really what we are talking about here, now, isn't it?'

'That, and other times', he replied, looking in my eyes intensely. So much for that cold shower, which only purpose was to quench my desire! I was feeling waves of warmth, threatening to overwhelm me. We had made love only twice on New Caprica; he took care of me and washed me when I was cold from that night searching survivors after the mud slide and those tender moments had been the best in my entire life. My voice dropped one octave, as I looked at him and replied softly, low, holding his gaze.

'So if the cylons hadn't come back?' We continued looking at one another unwavering, as he reflected on his response for a few seconds, as if he was weighting the intensity of our desire for each other against the responsibilities we had towards our people.

'But they did.' And we knew, we couldn't. We knew we were in a war, trying to survive. I looked at him with the intensity that this conversation had generated. And he added, approaching me: "we have certain responsibilities.' I nodded and replied: 'Yes, we do, Sir, and I…'. I was very close to him and the air was intensely charged with energy. He could not do this and get away with it. He could not talk about these nights and withdraw under the pretense of responsibilities, when we both knew we were burning with desire and when we both knew how much we cared for one another. What was the point of even bringing it up then?

'I will be back in a few days. And if you'd like we can… talk more about that night.' I turned around to grab my bag and leave. Half way through the room, I dropped all pretenses and turned around to look at him, as he was, head bent, staring at the ground.

'Bill? The answer is yes', I think it may have been the first time in a while that I addressed him by his first name in a workroom, outside of his quarters. The answer was 'yes' to everything, because I thought we needed one another despite our responsibilities. Our life was just too hard to face it alone.

'I absolutely would have built the cabin.' He lowered his eyes and smiled. I left to go back to Colonial One."

Did you like this? if so, please drop me a note in the comments. It is very important for me to know what you are thinking. I highly regard your comments and suggestions. They motivate me to write more ;)

Have a great week, everyone!